[News] Haiti Update - ongoing pressure to arrest President Aristide

[Anti-Imperialist News]

Dear Friends of Haiti:

Thank you from Haiti Action Committee for all your work to defend 
President Aristide and the Lavalas movement.  You responded immediately 
to action alerts, flooding the State Department with phone calls.  You 
signed and distributed an open letter condemning the repression in 
Haiti.  You came to our emergency demonstration in San Francisco on two 
days' notice, in solidarity with the thousands who marched in Haiti to 
mark the anniversary of the 1991 coup against Aristide. Your voices were 
heard here and in Haiti.

By the second day of our action alert, the State Department was already 
having subordinates answer the phone and they told several of us "We are 
getting a lot of calls about this."

THANK YOU!

We need to be prepared for another round of attacks against President 
Aristide and the democratic movement.  We will keep you posted and we 
may once again have to ask for your immediate support in the future.

With appreciation and gratitude,


Haiti Action Committee

*Haiti Update 10/30/14*

On Thursday, October 10th illegally appointed Judge Lamarre Belizaire 
pressed forward with his arrest order against President Aristide. 
President Aristide's residence is located within the jurisdiction of 
Croix-des-Bouquets near Port-au-Prince. The next day the D.A. or 
Commissaire of that jurisdiction questioned the legality of the warrant, 
as he was being pressured to carry out the arrest that day. He requested 
the entire legal package for his review, and was summarily dismissed 
from his job by the government of illegally selected President Martelly 
and Prime Minister Lamothe.

He was replaced with a new D.A., Souvenir Jeanty, a former member of the 
disbanded Haitian military with a reputation for brutality. Jeanty has 
pledged to carry out Judge Belizaire's order to arrest President 
Aristide, despite the call for Belizaire's legal recusal by Aristide's 
lawyers. The Minister of Justice, Jean Renel Sanon, is also a former 
officer of the disbanded military who according to some reports was 
dismissed in the late 1980's for alleged involvement in drug trafficking.

On October 16, three members of the CSPJ (the governing council 
overseeing the Haitian justice system) and the president of ANAMAH (the 
National Association of Haitian judges) publicly denounced the 
subjugation of the judicial system by the Martelly/Lamothe government, 
pointing to the political persecution of Martelly's opponents and the 
illegal firing and appointing of judges.

Attacks continue on Aristide and the grassroots multitudes who support 
him. Haiti Action Committee condemns the brutal assassination of 
activists and community organizers Paul Ambroise aka Ti Koton and 
Michael Benoit on October 8 as they were leaving a soccer match. 
Ambroise, an outspoken supporter of former President Aristide and 
aspiring mayoral candidate was killed along with Benoit in cold-blooded 
fashion by agents of the Martelly/Lamothe appointed mayor of 
Port-au-Prince, Pierre Rigaud Duplan, who was on the scene and pointed 
out the two. No arrest was made by the police.

HAC also condemns the brutal arrest of the Mascary couple from the 
southern island of Ile-a-Vache on Friday 10/24/14. The 89-year old wife 
and 82-year old husband were protesting the theft of their land and the 
bulldozing of their farm and livelihood as part of an island-wide 
land-grab for wealthy investors, who want to expropriate the residents' 
land and build exclusive resorts. The operations were conducted under 
the orders of another Martelly-appointed mayor, Fritz Cesar. Marc Donald 
(Jinal) Laines the President of KOPI, the peasant organization 
protesting land-grabs on the island, died last Saturday 10/25/14 of 
injuries sustained during a very suspicious "accident" the day before.

In other examples of the growing repression in the country, Haitian 
police attacked legal and peaceful demonstrations on September 30^th , 
October 17^th and October 26th. The September 30th demonstrations marked 
the 1991 coup by the Haitian military and those of October 17 
commemorated the assassination of Emperor Jean-Jacques Dessalines and 
the first coup in Haiti in 1806. On October 26th, "failed election day," 
people throughout Haiti were in the streets to demand that free and fair 
elections be held, which the Martelly/Lamothe government, acting as 
agents of the US/UN occupation, have once again denied the nation. In 
short, the picture that emerges is no election of local and national 
representatives, but rather appointment of people unaccountable to the 
community who carry out Martelly and Lamothe dictates. __

People had turned out in massive numbers on these three occasions to 
protest miserable living conditions, demand an end to the persecution of 
former President Aristide, call for the resignation of Martelly and 
Lamothe, and for free and fair elections. The police attacked the crowds 
with tear gas and a liquid skin-irritant, and they beat up peaceful 
demonstrators. Jean Nadal Aristide, a western region Lavalas 
coordination member and a spokesperson for the September 30th 
mobilization, was arrested on October 4th; again under a warrant issued 
by Belizaire, and nineteen demonstrators, including one dressed as 
Dessalines, were arrested on October 17th.

A preliminary list of the arrested organizers and participants in the 
October 26th protest includes Biron Odige, Rony Thimothe and three 
musicians from Port-au-Prince, along with Frantzou Dieu, Maxon Luxamar 
and Petuel Menton from Les Cayes. All are being kept in 
jail illegally in retaliation for their participation in the demonstrations.

Haiti Action Committee joins Congresswoman Maxine Waters, the Haitian 
attorneys who have brought an action in Haitian courts against the 
police, and the people of Haiti to denounce and condemn the on-going 
government repression.


Haiti Action Committee

www.haitisolidarity.net <http://www.haitisolidarity.net>
-- 
Freedom Archives 522 Valencia Street San Francisco, CA 94110 415 
863.9977 www.freedomarchives.org
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